Recently the ISU congress rejected a proposal, to many peoples disappointment, of abolishment of judge’s anonymity.
The latest action by the ISU is considered as a total disregard of the international outrage to its corruption, only demonstrating how the ISU as a sport organization was isolated, within its own old feudalism, from the rest of figure skating world.
But even if the ISU had accepted the proposal, it wouldn’t have amounted to much. It wouldn’t change the direction of the ISU and its dictatorship turning a deaf ear to the voice of figure skating communities.
It wouldn’t matter whether the ISU voted in favor of abolishment of judges’ anonymity or against it, unless the entire leadership was replaced. In fact, under 6.0 system, judges used to openly commit fraud. Judging scandal was a perennial companion to the sport. Never has the sport been free from one scandal or another.
Two things make Sochi Olympics unique. First, it was the ISU leadership that was reponsible for the fraud. Second, it was premeditated and systematically devised for a group of judges in Sochi to destroy the judging system itself by inventing bogus GOE and bogus PCS.
In 2013 through 2014, the ISU developed a scheme in which they shamelessly advocated Julia Lipnitskaia by dumping the established COP system to the sea of arbitrarism. Based on that set-up, they tried to sell skaters of their choice.
For the ISU it was a foolproof, because the whole show had been on through the Grand Prix. So they thought they could get away with Sochi showdown. But it didn’t cut. It only shows how their plot was based on quicksand.
That whole script seems good enough to make everything look legitimate but casting the washed-up actors in a show from pro-Soviet judges’ sabotage of old time may not.
Despite numerous scandals in the past, the sport itself has been resilient, thriving due to its idiosyncratic affinity to art. Figure skating dramatically evolved thanks to great skaters whose vision presaged the future and their timeless contribution paved the way of the sport and ultimately decided the sport as we know it today.
What sets Sochi Scandal apart from other scandals is the ISU leadership’s involvement and its systematic deception. In the past, when the international politics played dirty , it was an individual judge or judges that were politically motivated.
Of course, judges involved in Sochi are too politically oriented in that they are like minded with an agenda that Russian should rule the ladies figure skating in post Kim, but under the COP system well established in Kim’s tenure, their favorites were lacking of the kind of quality that the point number they earned should have reflected, that which viewers and spectators were accustomed to.
The future of figure skating looks bleak, not because the ISU didn’t sanction the proposal intended for judging accountability but because the ISU shows no sign of self-reformation as long as Ottavio Cinquanta remains in his seat.
Sochi Scandal unequivocally deprived the sport of its most needed standards that could keep skaters up in their endeavor to excel. Unless we see another star rise to revive the sport from a state of coma, it is difficult to tell what will become of the sport in the years to come.
